Tuesday, September 02, 2014

Have you ever finished up a knitting project that you're proud of, only to realize that while YOU may love it, and many of your knitting friends have encouraged you to move forward with the project, all of your non-knitting friends/peers give your newly finished project a sideways stare and say "Hm. That's cute."

Have you?

Do you know the kind of projects I mean?

For example, you fall in love with a skein of hand painted yarn and cast on a cardigan out of it, only to have it pool in 100 different places? You keep going because you manage to convince yourself that no one will ever notice, and your knitting friends assure you that they won't. But then along comes your non-knitting friends who take one quick look at it and go "You're really going to wear that?" Oh the face they would pull if they only knew what you had paid for the yarn...

Or maybe you cast on a pattern that includes a technique you have been simply dying to try, only to cast off and realize that perhaps it wasn't the best technique/ project pairing? Once again, your non-knitting friends are immediately captivated by the new technique you have tackled, while the non-knitters make you feel as you though cutting a hole at the top of a feed sack would have been more impressive.

I suspect this is because knitter's "get it". They know how much time you have invested in the knitting, they know why you would want to spend all that time fine tuning a new technique, and they know why you would want to drop all of that cash on those few skeins of hand painted yarn. They just walk your walk and speak your speak, and THAT, is really comforting.

I ask you all of this, because I am finding myself in that very predicament right now.

I have some dear friends expecting a baby, and I want to make them something jaw-droppingly-adorable.

So, I cast on a pair of baby pants.

While the yarn feels simply glorious, and my knitting friends have all gushed about them, I can already hear that dreaded "Hm. That's cute." from my non-knitting-baby-expecting friends.

While they will no doubt appreciate all of the work that I put into the pants, I think that they might wonder about my yarn selection and secretly hope and pray that 'Auntie Lynn' decides to never knit for their baby again.